There is now a definite autumnal feel, with daylight getting noticeably shorter and the trees becoming decked in their autumn colours.

The small garden birds are also becoming more visible and I have spotted wrens, robins, grey wagtails, blue tits and blackbirds to name a few. A few bumble bees appear now and then, but it has been a while now since I have spotted a butterfly. My pollen and nectar mix of flowers is still in full bloom with red, white and pink cosmos and a splash of yellow daisies poking their heads through the foliage lower down.

After a season of drought, which has necessitated the feeding of extra forage in the form of silage, haylage or hay, enough grass has managed to grow for Kevin to move his ewe lambs onto fresh pasture without having to give them any extra food. Many farmers have been forced to do this and it will be interesting to see if their conserved forage lasts through to next spring.

On Manor Farm drilling has continued, with more fields planted with winter wheat and winter barley. Extase has been put in one more field, but a new variety called Dawson has been planted in two other fields. Dawson is a wheat particularly used for animal feed. It is a variety that offers maximum flexibility, as it can be grown in all regions of the country and has a wide sowing window, including September, October and even up to the end of November. It yields well in all these different situations, having very good disease resistance, especially to a number of fungal diseases. If crops are resistant to fungal diseases it will reduce the number of fungicides that will need to be applied to the growing crop. There are soft wheats used for biscuits, cakes , other flours and also for export. Another use for soft wheats is in the distilling industry. Hard wheats are used to make bread and durum wheat is used to make spaghetti and pasta. The varieties grown depend on the climate. The climate here is more suited to the growing of soft wheat.

Apart from more drilling on Manor Farm Kevin has been cultivating his fields to be planted on Chiverlins and Showell Farm. He has been using a secondary germination, which is a piece of trailed machinery, with minimal gearing, built to go into pre- cultivated ground.

Primary cultivation is ploughing or using a primary cultivator such as a terradisc. Before Kevin could use the secondary germination he had to do some repairs, which were soon completed. The secondary germinator is used to create an optimal seed bed in only one pass. It is a 6m seedbed cultivator, with front and rear crumbles, levelling boards and five rows of spring tines.

Ian has ploughed and power harrowed the field of maize stubble which has now been drilled by Kevin. This field recently had a crop of forage maize harvested from it for silage, which will form part of the ration fed to our Angus cattle over the winter.

I recently went to London, particularly to visit and find out what is sold at Smithfield Market. This trip was wonderfully organised by NFU staff member Lydia Dahlin, who has responsibility for the South West Regional Livestock Board, whose 12 members were invited to attend.

I am one of two people from Wiltshire elected to be our county representatives.

The trip consisted of a very full itinerary of visits, which as I have said focused on Smithfield Market. This meant getting up at 4am , as the market selling beef and lamb , had almost sold all the meat before breakfast.

Next time I will tell you more about the places we went to and what we learnt.